Page 5 of Sweet Venom

“Don’t touch me!” she shouted and shoved me against the wall when I tried to rub ointment on her bruised face after a ‘client’ left. “You’re the reason I’m like this, you goddamn leech. I wish I’d killed you! Stop fucking looking at me with those disgusting eyes!”

Dave didn’t tell me not to look at him, but I lower my gaze anyway as I whisper, “Please let me go.”

“Why?” he slurs, stepping closer. “I can show you a good time.”

“No.” I try to speak loudly, but my voice comes out small. I’m incapable of screaming, because my mom stripped that away from me—among other things.

“All you women want is money, fucking sluts. I said I’ll show you a good time, so stop whining and thank me for it.” He pushes me, his large, heavy body that reeks of alcohol and sweat trapping me against the wall.

A low buzz starts in my ears, but I shove at his chest with unsteady hands.

“Dave…please don’t do this. Think of your little girl. You wouldn’t want her to be hurt like this, right?”

He wavers a bit, and I try to slowly disengage, my heart hammering in my ears. As I’m about to slip away, he grabs my breast over my hoodie, and bile fills my throat.

“Where ya think you’re going?” He fondles me as I push at his hand. “I wanna see your tits.”

I should knee him. He’s drunk, so he’d probably fall over?—

Before I can do that, a gloved hand wraps around Dave’s head and pulls him back so powerfully, he stumbles before he falls against the opposite wall.

I watch with complete horror as the tall, large man who’s dressed entirely in black slams his fist into Dave’s nose.

He flashes me a look over his shoulder, and I can finally see the face of the man who’s been stalking me for weeks as he says in a deep, gruff voice, “How annoying.”

2

VIOLET

Confrontation has never been my strong suit.

If anything, I avoid it like the plague, but the thing I avoid most?

Violence.

I’ve been in too many bad situations where I was overpowered by people so much bigger than me that I couldn’t have possibly taken them.

My mom. The men who visited her. My foster parents.

Dave just now.

All of them used their size to intimidate me, and I’m easily intimidated—a scaredy-cat through and through.

My favorite activities include reading, embroidering, and scribbling in my journal. Hell, even working is fine.

Anything is fine compared to being overpowered by another person.

Right now, however, I’m not the one being intimidated or thrown around.

It’s Dave.

He’s being held by the collar of his stained sleeveless shirt as a man drives his gloved fist into his face.

And it’s not justanyman.

It’s the man who’s been following me sporadically for over a month.

My stalker.